The Time Warner Center consists of two 750 foot (230 m) twin towers bridged by a multi-story atrium containing upscale retail shops. The complex also contains office and residential tenants. Construction began in November 2000, following the demolition of the New York Coliseum, and a topping-out ceremony was held on February 27, 2003. The property had the highest-listed market value in New York City, $1.1 billion, in 2006.[6]

Originally constructed as the AOL Time Warner Center, the building encircles the western side of Columbus Circle and straddles the border between Midtown and the Upper West Side. The total floor area of 2.8 million square feet (260,000 m2) is occupied by office space, including the offices of WarnerMedia (formerly Time Warner) and an R&D center for VMware; residential condominiums; and the Mandarin Oriental, New York hotel. The Shops at Columbus Circle is an upscale shopping mall located in a curving arcade at the base of the building, with a large Whole Foods Market grocery store on the lower level. Deutsche Bank will replace Time Warner as the anchor tenant of the 1,100,000-square-foot (100,000 m2) office area beginning in 2021, at which time it will be renamed the Deutsche Bank Center.[7]

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The redevelopment of the New York Coliseum site at Columbus Circle was first proposed in 1985. It was delayed for nearly 15 years after Mortimer Zuckerman's Boston Properties initially won a bidding contest to buy the property from the New York Coliseum's owners, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. The company proposed to construct a headquarters for Salomon Brothers on the 4.5-acre (18,000 m2) Coliseum site.[8] Opponents of the project were concerned it would cast a shadow on Central Park.[9] In 1988, the sale was nullified[10] and Salomon Brothers withdrew from the project.[11] New York City and Boston Properties renegotiated the deal to call for a 52-story structure designed by David Childs at a reduced price of $357 million.[12]

The plan still languished until 1998 when the Coliseum site was sold to Time Warner and The Related Companies for $345 million.[13] The Coliseum was demolished in 2000.[14] The Time Warner Center was the first major building to be completed in Manhattan after the September 11 attacks, although it was already under construction at the time of the attacks in 2001. While some New Yorkers noted the uncanny resemblance of the Time Warner Center to the fallen Twin Towers, the building's developer refuted any intentional similarity.[15] It was opened in phases in 2003.[16]

The Sunshine Group was in charge of marketing the building. Sandie N. Tillotson bought the top floor of the then uncompleted north tower for $30 million shortly after the September 11 attacks — a record for a condominium at the time.[17] That sale would be eclipsed in 2003 when Mexican financier David Martinez paid $54.7 million for a penthouse condo, then a record for New York residential sales.

In January 2014, Time Warner sold its stake in the Columbus Circle building for $1.3 billion to Related Companies, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, and GIC Private Limited and formally announced it would move in late 2018 to 30 Hudson Yards, a development owned by Related.[18]

In May 2018, Deutsche Bank announced that it was leasing the entire 1,100,000-square-foot (100,000 m2) formerly occupied by Time Warner for 25 years, beginning in the third quarter of 2021.[19] Following the news, Related Companies announced that the complex would be officially renamed the Deutsche Bank Center upon the company's arrival.[7]

The Time Warner Center has 55 floors. The top floor is labeled as the 77th floor.[20]

A multistory cable-net wall serves as the entrance to the atrium where the center's two 55-story towers intersect. Spanning 98 feet (30 m) across and 160 feet (50 m) high, the cable structure was the largest in North America at the time of its completion.[21]

The lobby and shops in Time Warner Center

The building has several street addresses, including 10 Columbus Circle for offices, 25 Columbus Circle for the south tower that was named "One Central Park" and 80 Columbus Circle for The Residences at Mandarin Oriental. The address One Central Park West, meanwhile, belongs to the Trump International Hotel and Tower across Broadway. Upon the completion of the Time Warner Center, Trump made a "little joke" at the Time Warner Center's expense by hanging a large sign on his building gloating, "Your views aren’t so great, are they? We have the real Central Park views and address."[22]

The center has ground floor tenants including designer shops and restaurants.[24] On February 5, 2004, Whole Foods Market opened its 68,000 square feet (6,300 m2) Columbus Circle store in the Time Warner Center.[25] In 2005, the wine shop in the store closed after the store pleaded no contest to state charges of illegal operation. Whole Foods planned to replace the center with an expanded coffee bar, a gelato counter, and additional checkout lines.[26] Upper floors include the restaurants Masa, Per Se and Porter House New York.